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Arts Integration

Handbook By Seacoast Charter School

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Arts Integration Handbook

Contributors from SCS Staff: Ellen Roos-Unger Kate Yates Becky Reickert Jacki Rice

Andrea Ambrose Jocalyn Beaton Theresa Lorvig John Dinger

Amy Hill Kristin Larabee Zoe Bandola Jen Bova

Catherine Colby Christyn Surprenant Breighan Gardner Judy Lee

Mary Dellea

Edited by: Jenny Procter and Roberta Mantione

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The Artistic Process: Three Approaches to Encouraging Creative Thinking Creativity is not only about the arts, or particular types of talented people. We all have the capacity

for creative thinking – for generating and extending ideas, applying imagination and looking for alternative

and innovative ways to solve problems. Creativity means generating outcomes that are original and of value.

Creative thinking is also about our ability to recognize the value of ideas.

Creative children need creative teachers, but there are many blocks to creativity. One block may be

defensive teaching. There is little chance for creativity where students work for long periods of time with

low demand and little active input, or where outcomes are controlled and prescribed, or complex topics

taught in superficial ways. Creativity thrives where there is time to explore, experiment and play with ideas.

Children need the right conditions for creativity to flourish. Seacoast Charter School teachers have been

dedicated to offering high engagement and active involvement in open ended and complex projects.

This offers our students many opportunities for creative thinking; children generating ideas, demonstrating

imagination and originality, and evaluating the work they have done. Teachers promote a questioning

classroom, where everyone values diversity, asks challenging questions; makes new connections; represent

ideas in different ways – visually, physically and verbally; try fresh approaches and solutions to problems;

and critically evaluate new ideas and actions.

Over the years staff have valued resources for supporting their work with students in this arena. We are

sharing three of those approaches, knowing that not every approach works for every person.

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Artful Thinking:

A Project Zero Resource From Harvard School of Education

The Artful Thinking program is designed to be used by the regular classroom teacher. While it originally

targeted grades K-12, the Artful Thinking approach is also currently used in post-secondary education

and in museums. The program focuses on experiencing and appreciating art, rather than making art. It has

two broad goals: (1) To help teachers create rich connections between works of art and curricular topics;

and (2) to help teachers use art as a force for developing students’ thinking dispositions.

The program takes the image of an artist’s palette as its central metaphor. Typically, a palette is made up

of a relatively small number of basic colors which can be used and blended in a great variety of ways. The

artful thinking palette is comprised of 6 thinking dispositions – 6 basic colors, or forms, of intellectual

behavior – that have dual power: They are powerful ways of exploring works of art, and powerful ways of

exploring subjects across the school curriculum.

The Artful Thinking palette comes alive through the use of “thinking routines.” Each thinking disposition

has several thinking routines connected to it. Thinking routines are short, easy-to-learn mini-strategies that

extend and deepen students’ thinking and become part of the fabric of everyday classroom life. They are

used flexibly and repeatedly -- with art, and with a wide variety of topics in the curriculum, particularly in

language arts and social studies.

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The Artful Thinking Routines

Reasoning-centered routines:

"WHAT MAKES YOU SAY THAT?" Interpretation with Justification Routine

CLAIM / SUPPORT / QUESTION A Reasoning Routine

Perspective taking-centered routines:

PERCEIVE/KNOW/CARE ABOUT A routine for getting inside viewpoints

Questioning & Investigating-centered

routines:

I SEE / I THINK / I WONDER A routine for exploring works of art and other interesting things

THINK / PUZZLE / EXPLORE A routine that sets the stage for deeper inquiry

CREATIVE QUESTIONS A routine for creating thought-provoking questions

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A Design Process from The Universal Traveler

Seacoast Charter School staff members have adapted the design process from the

book “The Universal Traveler” by Don Koberg and Jim Bagnall for teaching process.

These stages in the design process support students in many areas of problem solving

including the arts. This guide enables students to think creatively while following a

structured process. This tool has offered strategies to students as they plan projects

and solve problems in their work.

In their introduction to creativity the authors describe the essentials:

“In order to improve something and do it creatively, it is necessary, first, to identify what it

is that actually needs improving; second, to understand the interactive factors involved;

and third, to develop the required skills and tools to manage the task.”

Students have been more successful problem solvers and discovered a more creative

process using the design tools from this book.

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Design Process Routines:

Accept: Getting Started

Stating your initial intentions

Accept the problem as a challenge

Analyze: Gather Facts and Feelings

Become familiar with the problem

Define: Determine the Essentials for Success

Determine the main issues of the problem

Conceptualize the aims and goals

Ideate: Generating Alternatives

Identify all possible ways of realizing goals

Select: Choose the best option

Compare the possible options and choose the best match

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The Inspirational Design Approach

Artists and teachers alike can use another approach that stems from their inspiration

from the world around them. This process can be a linear one or it can spiral through

some or all of the steps.

The author of Ceramic Design Course, Anthony Quinn describes it like this:

“Inspiration comes from looking at the world with a new perspective. Use diverse

methods to create, collect, and collate ideas, such as photography, drawing, listening,

writing, painting, and collage, to gain a broad understanding of your source material.

When you have been through many types of research and collected many resources,

check that you have enough information to begin working up the project.”

He suggests that we start with a “good body of visual stimuli” to begin our work in the

arts. Other writers have called this “visual research” and have found that children's

artwork is enhanced when they have models to guide them.

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Inspirational Design Process:

Visual Inspiration: Explore and seek visual inspiration, study source material

Author/Illustrator Steve Jenkins inspiration work is described like this:

Once he knows what he wants to illustrate, he collects his references. He may visit zoos,

or the aquarium. He takes photographs and looks at a lot of books.

"I don't do the actual studies there, but I find it useful to get an appreciation of how

beautiful and subtle they actually are. I do an outline drawing based on the references

and how I want them to look on the page. Then I do a quick color setting to figure out

what paper I'm going to use in the collage.”

Mood Boards:

Collect your research and create a board with your inspirations.

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Conceptualize: Analyze and make connections, learn to explain your intentions in a coherent way

Sketch: Sketch with purpose as a way to visualize your ideas, and then experiment with materials.

Modeling:

Understand the importance of accuracy while building a model of your project to scale. Building out of a

variety of materials gives students new insights.

Testing: Some projects involve testing your design looking to verify important design decisions.

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Presentation: This is the opportunity to create a strong presentation of the whole process, showing your inspiration,

your sketches, your model, and your final product for celebration and sharing. This is a key piece of

communicating your work and your aesthetics.

Resources: Artful Thinking: http://www.pzartfulthinking.org/overview.php

Universal Traveler: by Don Kober and Jim Bagnall

Axzo Press, 2003

Ceramic Design Course: by Anthony Quinn Barron's Educational Series, 2007

Creative Thinking: Robert Fisher Teaching Creative Thinking

http://www.teachingthinking.net/thinking/web%20resources/robert_fisher_expanding

minds.htm

Kennedy Center: http://www.kennedy-

center.org/education/ceta/arts_integration_definition.pdf

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The Kennedy Center’s

Definition for Arts Integration:

Arts Integration is

an APPROACH to TEACHING

in which students

construct and demonstrate

UNDERSTANDING

through an

ART FORM.

Students engage in a

CREATIVE PROCESS

which CONNECTS

an art form and another subject area

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Aesthetic Classrooms

Creating an aesthetic classroom defines the space as an arts space where children and adults can find arts

materials, inspiration from art on the walls, or just a colorful beautiful space to work in during their day.

Think about using natural materials, good lighting, art work by the children and by adult artists. Organize

art materials so they are readily available. Create invitations to use the materials in new ways. Keep track of

dead plants, trash, and old papers so they don’t clutter your work space. You can shop garage sales and

grandmother’s basements.

Resources: Eric Jensen’s book: Environments for Learning

Designs for Living and Learning: Transforming Early Childhood Environments [Paperback]

Deb Curtis and Margie Carter

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ARTS INTEGRATION

INSPIRATIONAL

Mini-LESSONS From Seacoast Charter School

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Accordion Books: Demonstrating Life Cycles through Art

The structure of a book can often support the structure of the concept you are teaching. Offering a visual

art model that delineates the writing model for students helps to organize their planning. In this case,

students were observing the life cycle of a butterfly in their classroom. Each page of the book has a

detailed drawing with deep color and text that describes stage of life from caterpillar to butterfly. One of

the keys to the art work is to give students a thin black sharpie to outline their drawings and then add color.

Materials: large sheets of card stock or heavy colored paper, black sharpies, oil pastels, white

rectangular paper to fit into pockets of the book, sewing the books with a zig zag stitch makes for a sturdier

book

Resource: Making Books That Fly, Fold, Wrap, Hid, Pop Up, Twist and Turn: Books for Kids to

Make By Gwen Dien

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Sand Tray Storytelling: developing clarity in writing

The concept of using trays of sand and a variety of miniatures to help children was developed in England

in the 1920's by Margaret Lowenfeld. Her search for a tool that would instantaneously attract children

and encourage communication of thoughts and feelings lead her to the use of sand trays.

Method: The teacher reads the featured book aloud, modeling proven reading comprehension strategies

and inviting the students to participate in discussions focusing on those strategies. Vocabulary is reviewed

and, after the read aloud, students can build a collaborative sand tray that depicts the elements of the

story. The session ends with students being invited to build an individual sand tray which may extend the

text, or have a different theme. Students can dictate or write their stories with drawings or photographs of

their sand tray.

Materials: wooden box with sides, fine grade sand, miniature characters

Resource: http://www.sandtraycenter.com/Sandtray_Literacy_Sessions.html

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Matisse: Using collage to explore color and shape

Fifth graders used work by Matisse during his collage period to explore how the placement of colors and

shapes could influence the emotions in a collage. Ideas that we worked with included using positive and

negative shapes and the concept of overlapping shapes. This kind of work in art can lead to discussions

about making inferences about works of art that lay the foundation for making inferences from text.

Materials: bright colored tag paper or construction paper, black paper, glue, background paper in

bright colors

Resources: Henri Matisse: Drawing with Scissors by O’Connor and Hartland

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Movement Breaks to Build Focus with Theresa

Theresa’s fifth and sixth grade discovered that a daily break for intentional movement sharpened their

ability to focus on their work. The specific moves were developed by a parent who is an Occupational

Therapist. However, similar patterns of movement can be found in the resources below. Both research and

experience have shown that students who have time to move during the teaching day have the ability to

prolong their work time. The arts offer a variety of ways to accomplish this in a day with dance, drumming,

singing, or even a hula hoop break that might see in Jocalyn’s room during snack time.

Resources: Smart Moves: Why Learning is Not All in Your Head by Carla Hannaford Ph.D.

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Example from Theresa’s class Jocalyn’s class

Science Notebooks: Blending Science and Art with Theresa

Put away the lab reports and grab your colored pencils! We are going to create an Integrated Science Journal.

I’ll present Integrated Science Notebooks as a tool to help students learn organizational and note taking strategies,

but more importantly Integrated Notebooks also provide a critical platform for students to improve their analytic skills

and practice how to reflect on and communicate what they are thinking and learning through writing across the

curriculum. Research has shown that science notebook writing may also be a way for students to strengthen their

language skills as they develop an understanding of the world around them. These notebooks are living documents

that allow you to assess students' understanding and provide the feedback as students are developing their

understanding of scientific concepts.

Materials: your choice of notebook, colored pencils, watercolors

Resources: Teaching Science with Interactive Notebooks, Kellie Marcarelli ($35)

Writing in Science in Action, Betsy Rupp Fulwiler , with DVD. (Heinemann) ($35)

Science Notebooks, Writing about inquiry, Brian Campbell and Lori Fulton ($20)

Notebook foldables, Dinah Zike ($15)

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Painting BIG: Using art to focus on detail

“I’ll paint what I see-what the flower is to me but I’ll paint it big and they will be surprised into taking

time to look at it.” Georgia O’Keefe

Georgia O’Keefe flower paintings can inspire children to paint on big paper with big brushes

with lots of color. This can result in paintings without the inhibition or constraint of more structured

projects, giving life to children’s paintings. Adding details can then be done by; using a smaller brush

at the end, layering color, adding texture, or use a magnifier with a flower to notice more details to

add.

Materials: 18”x24” paper, big brushes, tempera paint, many examples of O’Keefe’s flower

paintings, and real flowers in the room.

Resources: Georgia O’Keefe prints (could be collected from a calendar), My Name Is Georgia:

A Portrait by Jeanette Winter, Through Georgia's Eyes - Rachel Victoria Rodriguez

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Dramatizing Stories to Understand Main Ideas

Children want to be IN a story and nothing supports their deep engagement more than a story

dramatization where they get to act out the story as the characters. Dramatization can be as simple as

children participating in repeating lines of a story or motions and gestures or a full on drama where they act

out key parts of the plot. Insights into characters and motives often come during such a dramatization and

often from the children you least expect.

Resources: Roadrunner's Dance by Rudolfo Anaya and David Diaz(Aug 7, 2000)

A Dramatic Approach to Reading Comprehension by Lenore Blank Kelner and Rosalind M. Flynn

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Finger Knitting with Kindergarten: Developing fine motor skills with Jenny

Finger knitting supports the development of fine motor skills in the hands and fingers. Children should have

strength and dexterity in their hands and fingers before being asked to manipulate a pencil on paper.

Working on dexterity and strength first can eliminate the development of an inappropriate pencil grasp,

which is becoming more commonplace as young children are engaged in writing experiences before their

hands are ready. Finger knitting becomes a passionate pastime for kids so get enough yarn!

Resources: Kids Knitting: Projects for Kids of all Ages [Paperback] Melanie Falick (Author), Kristin Nicholas (Illustrator), Chris Hartlove (Photographer)

Finger Knitting 2 (Vol 2) Suzuki Katsino (Author)

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Reader’s Theater: Building Fluency Through Repeated Readings

Reader’s Theater is reading a story aloud, like a play, without memorization, usually without props

or a stage. Students are each assigned a character role and read their part with expression, meaning

and enthusiasm.

Reader's Theater provides readers with legitimate reason to reread text and to practice fluency.

Reader's theater also promotes cooperative interaction with peers and makes the reading task appealing."

"Put Reading First: The Research Building Blocks for Teaching Children to Read"

Materials: Scripts, highlighters to mark reader’s parts

Resources: Readers Theater for Building Fluency: Strategies and Scripts for Making the Most of

This Highly Effective, Motivating... by Jo Worthy

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Tableau: Building imagery for comprehension

A tableau is a scene from a text created by students creating a still image to represent an important idea

using only their bodies. There are no props, only an emphasis on gesture.

Research: Critical Thinking and Reading Strategies used in tableau

Making Inferences

Using Prior Knowledge Making Connections (Text to Text, Text to Self, Text to World)

Synthesizing Information

Asking Questions

Resource: Video from A Dramatic Approach To Reading Comprehension @

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nlxw9qflKxk

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Engineering Collaborations: Building a Marble Run

with third and eighth graders with Kristin and Kyla

This project was one of those accidental genius moments that solved a momentary problem

while meeting the new common core standards including:

1. Asking Questions and Defining Problems

2. Developing and Using Models

3. Planning and Carrying out Investigations

Resource: Janice VanCleave's Engineering for Every Kid: Easy Activities

That Make Learning Science Fun J anice VanCleave (Author)

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Middle School Hand Built Pottery with Jen

Clay is a luscious experience for students. They require time to squeeze and roll and pinch clay before

beginning any work with it. Then they need to understand how to balance water and clay so they can make

their pieces attach while keeping them from cracking. The integration of clay into the curriculum can take

many different pathways including the use of clay to build characters, dioramas, or to create a cultural

object of significance.

Materials: clay, clay tools, inspiration, technical support

Resources: Ceramics for Beginners: Hand Building by Shay Amber

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Photography with Tim Gaudreau: Artist in Residence

with Christyn in the After School Program

Christyn used photography as a tool to build awareness of ecological issues. The next step was writing

about their photos. She painted one dollar frames from Michael’s so that students had a photo gallery

exhibit of their photography.

Resource: Kids, Cameras, and the Curriculum: Focusing on Learning in the Primary

Grades Pat Barrett Dragan (Author)

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Engineering Study: the bridge builders with Kristin’s

Third and fourth explore force as a major theme in three types of bridges; beam, truss, and arch bridges.

Students designed and built bridges out of a variety of materials. They also did detailed drawings and

paintings of their bridges.

Materials: K’nex bridge building kits, balsa wood and glue, paper and cardboard, oil pastels and paints

Resource: The Brooklyn Bridge: The story of the world's most famous bridge and the

remarkable family that built it. Elizabeth Mann Alan Witschonke (Illustrator)

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Integrating Math and Art Using Tessellations

in Zoe’s Fifth/Sixth grade

A Tessellation is when you cover a surface with a pattern of flat shapes so that there are no

overlaps or gaps. Tessellations can expand a study of symmetry and polygons. Simple

tessellations can be taught to younger children. Ongoing experience builds a stronger sense of

symmetry by using the slide, rotate, and flip methods of repeating the pattern.

Resources: M.C. Escher: Coloring Book by Abrams and Introduction to Tessellations Dale Seymour (Author), Jill Britton (Author)

Try the tessellation game at this web site:

http://www.pbs.org/parents/education/math/games/first-second-grade/tessellation/

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Quilting the Big Ideas in 7/8 Grade Language Arts with John and Jenny

John’s 7/8 grade class read a book called “Iqbal” by Francesco D’Adamo. This book is a novel based on the real

life of Iqbal Masih, a real child slave in the Pakistan rug trade who managed to escape. In the course of his brief life,

Iqbal worked with activists and humanitarians to bring awareness to the plight of child slave. On Easter Sunday in

1995 the Carpet Mafia murdered Iqbal outside Lahore , Pakistan. He was only 13. His name has become a symbol;

of the battle to liberate millions of children worldwide from violence and slavery.

The students in John’s class decided to make a quilt that resembled a rug. Each square was chosen to depict a

chapter in the book. Each student chose a design that would best represent the feeling or focus of their chapter.

After preliminary line drawings and sketches the students chose fabric and recreated their drawing using cloth and

the appliqué process. We chose the pattern to resemble a traditional rug pattern called “Hope”

Materials: Fabric Scraps, fabric glue, yardage for backing…a friendly parent to sew it all together!

Resource: Creative Quilting with Kids by Maggie Ball and Mark Frey

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In this project we used the structure of the mandala as our design format.

The idea behind a Mandela design is that it is symbolic of the universe. As a part of our Meso-American unit study,

5th and 6th graders designed these mandala-style batiks to be symbolic of Mayan culture. Students learned about

the importance of various gods, crops, animals and symbols and then used that information to create their own pieces

with the ideas of symmetry and traditional design in mind.

Students designed their pieces on paper first, then transferred them, using special glue, onto the muslin cloth

squares. Once the glue was dry, students painted the cloth using vibrant colors often found in Maya paintings and

clothing. Once the paint was dry the pieces were washed in the machine to remove the glue and highlight the design.

This project allowed for all ranges of creativity and ability and was highly motivational. Because of the background

knowledge they had already acquired, everyone went right to work with a design in mind. Some students chose

traditional designs and shapes to use, while others really connected with the symbolic nature of certain hieroglyph

pictures, while still some others created original symbols and designs to represent the things they knew the Maya

people held sacred like monkeys, corn and the stars.

Resource: Low Budget version of batik at http://missyoungsartroom.blogspot.com/2013/05/5th-grade-

batik-mandalas.html

BATIK

MANDALAS

By

5th and 6th Grade

Becky’s Class

MAYAN Theme

Social Studies/

Arts Integration

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by peter on Artsonia

Fauvist Portraits with Fifth and Sixth Graders

Fifth and sixth graders explored the bold colors and brush strokes of the Fauvist painters of the

early 1900’s as part of their classroom study. They did a portrait of a classmate and used the style

of bold colors. They followed the elements of Fauvist painters using non-traditional colors and

discussed how to identify emotion expressed through color. They attempted to create spontaneous

paintings with an explosion of color. The work of Matisse was the inspiration.

Materials: a palette of bright colors of paint, brushes, examples of Matisse’s work

Resources: Fauvism (World of Art) [Paperback] Sarah Whitfield

A great idea for kids of all ages at : http://mysmallpotatoes.com/2012/09/12/where-the-fauve-

things-are-studying-the-great-artist-henri-matisse-2/

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STAGECRAFT: Mini -Theaters for

Story Retelling in K-2 Grades

Story Retelling is an activity that helps a child take part in reconstructing stories. It encourages both social

and academic development. While retelling a story the work the child does results in increased language

development, comprehension and an interest in books and in learning to read (Evans & Strong 1996).

Using the puppets and stage building enhances the retelling with rich detail in both character and setting.

Materials: Foam for base, fabric scraps, beads, wood, wire, decorative objects

Resource: Teacher’s College Rubric

http://readingandwritingproject.com/public/themes/rwproject/resources/assessments/reading/leveled_assessment_suppor

t_materials/l-z_retell_rubric.pdf

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Fabric Collages for Kindergarten: Building Visualization Skills

In the Princess and the Pea with Judy

Based on his research on engaged reading, Jeffrey Wilhelm believes that as teachers, we need to help

students build images, story worlds, and mental models that help them read, understand and reflect.

Materials: Fabric scraps, oil pastels, watercolor paints, strong paper

Resources: Reading Is Seeing By Jeffrey D. Wilhelm

The Princess and the Pea Hans Christian Andersen (Author), Maja Dusikova (Illustrator)

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Chalk and Glue Insects with Second Graders

The use of a large pallet with second graders offered them the opportunity to explore detail in a way that

their usual small works don’t allow. The use of chalk with strong colors allowed them to create pieces that

were powerful in their presence and allowed their audiences to stop and think about their work. Students

modeled their work of Steve Jenkins with his large detailed colorful picture of beetles. After their initial

sketch, they outlined the details of their insects with black glue filling in with deep chalk color.

Materials: black foam core, chalk with intense colors, glue can be darkened with black paint to outline shapes.

Resources: The Beetle Book by Steve Jenkins

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Puppets should be Works of Art: Setting up a BUFFET of Art Materials

with Christyn’s Afterschool program

The quality of the materials you use with students predict the outcome you will have. Banish all thoughts of

making puppets out of paper bags! Look for good quality socks or felt. Create a buffet of materials to

embellish the puppets and teach students the many options they have to create a variety of characters with

different materials.

Materials: felt, great socks!, yarn, buttons, ribbon, colorful fabric, thread and needles, hot glue gun

Resource: Puppet Theatre (Crafts and Family Activities) [Hardcover]

Maija Baric (Author), Kristiina Louhi (Illustrator)

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Making Puppets Move: with Christyn’s Afterschool Artist in Residence

If you’ve watched young students use puppets to flop or attack during a puppet show, you need the advice

of the book, Making Puppets Come Alive. The puppeteer who worked with our afterschool program

made huge strides in one afternoon as she had students practice walking, running, talking, sleeping and

showing emotion with their puppets.

Materials: puppets that move with the puppeteers hand work best

Resource: Making Puppets Come Alive: How to Learn and Teach Hand Puppetry Larry Engler and

Carol Fijan

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Found Poetry with SCS Teachers Workshop

Found poetry is a type of poetry created by taking words, phrases, and sometimes whole passages from

other sources and reframing them as poetry by making changes in spacing and lines, or by adding or deleting

text, thus imparting new meaning.

Materials: words from poems or magazines or stories, watercolor paints, paper, glue, a wonderful mentor

poem

Resource: Poetry Lessons to Meet the Common Core State Standards: Exemplar Poems With

Engaging Lessons and Response Activities That Help Students Read, Understand, and Appreciate

Poetry Georgia Heard

photo example from http://artistsoftheroundtable.smugmug.com/Workshops/RAW-Art-Journaling/Arlene-

Holtz/18258528_Z2qmvk/1444323032_4NmSc8z#!i=1444323032&k=4NmSc8z&lb=1&s=L

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Musical Stories: The Drums of Noto Hanto with Mary D.

The story of the people of Japan fighting off the invaders with their masks and drums is a fascinating

story. The retelling of the story, with children’s masks and the drumming patterns made the story come alive.

The combination of music and storytelling is a powerful combination.

Materials: A variety of drums, masks made of cardboard with embellishments

Resource: The Drums of Noto Hanto by J.Alison James (Author), "Tsukushi" (Illustrator)

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Spontaneous Dance Routines from Artful Students in Kate’s Class

Using Movement to Teach Kinesthetic Learners the Common Core

Many young learners have an “aha” moment when they are able to translate concepts from any

discipline into movement. It gives them opportunity to deepen understanding and build memory. Teachers

can use both spontaneous movements; as in letting students create a movement while they spell their sight

words out loud, or they can use prepared lesson plans that specifically target a science or math concept.

Materials: a good music collection

Resources: http://education.byu.edu/arts/documents/educational_movement.pdf,

http://www.mathandmovement.com/http://dpi.state.nc.us/curriculum/artsed/resources/handbook/dance/28integr

ation#teaching,

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Theater Games : Improvisation to Develop Character with Jacki

How to Play “Park Bench”: begin by asking one student to be the first innocent bench sitter. Tell

the bench sitter that she/he is sitting there minding their own business when a new person comes and sits

down next to them - and encourage the next child to come and join the first. The second person's job is to

say or do something to make the first person leave. The first person's job - and this is an important point to

make - is to allow the second person's statement or action to make them want to leave. When the first

person gets up and leaves, the second person moves into their spot and becomes the next innocent bench

sitter and receives the next child in line who will now make them leave. The original innocent bench sitter

goes to the end of the line of the rest of the future park bench sitters to await their own turn.

Resource: 101 Improv Games for Children and Adults by Bob Bedore

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Cartoon Characters with Jen’s Middle School

Cartooning is a favorite among older students who love to learn the details of the creative process and

development of a cartoon from brainstorming to final draft.

It’s important for them to learn the correct terminology associated with cartooning and recognize the

different kinds of cartooning including gag comics, comic strip, and caricature.

Materials: black sharpies, colored pencils, models

Resource: Cartooning For Kids by Mike Artell

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Intuitive Painting: The Wetlands in Spring

with Catherine’s 1 /2 grade

Intuitive painting of the wetlands was a way to know a place intimately by knowing it in different ways.

Students first explored, observed, studied, experimented and drew in their science journals.

Toward the end of the study, Catherine asked students to paint expressively from their experience

of being in the wetlands in spring. Intuitive painting gives kids permission; permission to paint what

they feel, permission to use as much paint as they want, and permission to enjoy the process.

Materials: tempera paints, brushes, paper

Resource: Brave Intuitive Painting-Let Go, Be Bold, Unfold!: Techniques for Uncovering

Your Own Unique Painting Style by Flora S. Bowley

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Quilt Collages and Writing Reflections with Jocalyn

Students in Jocalyn’s third/fourth grade wrote their reading reflections and tucked them under their paper

quilt squares to create a large quilt that created a meaningful exhibit of their work. They first made the

collage paper with an Eric Carle painting technique and then chose four squares to match their four

reflections.

Materials: paper squares, paint, brushes

Resource: The Keeping Quilt and a Patricia Polacco book collection

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Teaching Visual Thinking Strategies Using Paintings with Judy

Studies have found that VTS builds critical thinking skills that students transfer to other

settings and other subjects, including writing, math, social studies, and science. It teaches students to use evidence

based thinking that leads to stronger writing when they are used to backing up their thinking with evidence from the

painting. Transfer of visual thinking to written has shown to be a positive strategy.

Teachers are asked to use these open-ended questions when looking at a painting:

1. What do you see?

2. What is happening in this artwork?

3. Do you have any ideas how the artist made this work?

4. What story does this artwork tell?

5. If you could add something to this artwork what would it be?

6. If this artwork could talk, what might it say?

7. What would you title this piece?

8. What do you feel when you look at this artwork? What emotions do you feel?

9. What message so you think the artist was trying to tell us with this artwork?

10. Is this realistic or fantasy?

11. Find primary, secondary colors, warm or cool.

12. What shapes can you find in this artwork?

Materials: age appropriate art prints

Resources: Visual Thinking Strategies at http://www.vtshome.org/

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Sun and Moon Collage with Andrea’s First and Second Graders

This project was part of a sun & star unit. Students studied stories both fiction and non-fiction about the sun. Each did

research on one constellation. This was the end-of-the-year collaborative project.

They created the sun and moon on two canvases. Then they painted the sun, moon, and backgrounds of both the

canvases with acrylic paints. Each student painted a piece of tissue paper and used acrylic paints to make different

patterns inspired by their yearlong study of collage and Eric Carle’s art work.

Materials: tissue paper, canvas, acrylics, modge podge

Resource: Eric Carle Picture Writer: The Art of the Picture Book

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Poetry Anthologies with Jacki’s Seventh and Eighth Graders

Students edited an anthology with personal poetry that described something about them as

individuals, and then added collections of different types of poetry such as an ode, a haiku, a

ballad, and lyric and narrative poems. Finally they wrote their own poems to include in the

anthology.

Materials: Collage materials for the cover of the book

Resources: Poetry collections, online resources of poetry

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Science, Engineering and an Artist Study

Kate’s third graders were involved in an integrated arts study of Newton’s laws of force and motion and an

exploration of artist Ned Kahn’s large installation art based on those laws. The students created their own

engineering diagrams for force and motion while learning about the aesthetics of Ned Kahn’s work. In his

artist statement Kahn describes one of the goals of arts integration when he talks about how the

“confluence of science and art” captures the mystery of the world around us. This project captured

students interest and imagination as they applied scientific thinking to their artwork.

Materials: classroom supplies, recycled materials, lots of tape

Resources: http://nedkahn.com/

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Poetry and Painting with Brieghan and the 1 /2 class

Night

Night comes to the ocean

like a jellyfish.

It floats along with the water.

Its tentacles decorate the sky.

By Charlotte Maffei

Materials: Watercolors, easels, watercolor paper

Resources: Carl Sandburg’s Poem “Fog”

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Moon Study : Using Painting in Collaboration with Science

by Catherine and the First and Second Graders

As part of their exploration of space and the work within the new science standards,

first and second graders were observing the moon and night sky each night for a month and recording their

observations in their science journals.

The class study of Van Gogh’s Starry Night led students to create their own starry night drawings and

poetry to describe their moon experiences. The use of oil pastels meant that there were rich colors in their

work. After their drawings, children wrote poems to describe their moon experiences.

The moon is like the face of your child

Asleep at midnight

All cozy in their beds

They could look like anything. Maddie Second Grade

Materials: oil pastels, paper

Resource: Moon Journals: Writing, Art, and Inquiry Through Focused Nature Study Gina Rester-Zodrow

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Using the Visual Arts to Support the Common Core

Jocalyn used an opportunity from a Patricia Polacco author study to build a scenario from the book

with children’s summaries written on stars. During the learning celebration with parents, children were able

to be much more metacognitive about their work and their thinking because they were supported by all of

the visual projects in the room associated with their reading and writing. Each area of the room had an

assignment that demonstrated student work in one area of the common core requirements for reading or

writing. And at the same time, it appeared to be an art exhibit!

Materials: paper, watercolor, the standards

Resources: Patricia Polacco book collection

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Sock Dolls: Building Schema for Comprehending Text

Making sock dolls with children is almost magical. The experience of changing an ordinary sock into a

beloved character shows them the transformation that can happen with the arts. Used in conjunction with

literacy, this art project enhances the understanding of the text by building up the child’s interaction with

the character of the book. This project is especially successful with the reading and writing of biographies.

Often, the creation of the sock doll leads children to move past minute or distracting details in the story to

understand the big ideas.

Materials: socks of different colors, embellishments such as beads, yarn, fabric scraps, and stuffing

Resources: http://www.wikihow.com/Make-a-Sock-Doll

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Arts Integrations Chapter Lessons